There was a startling bleep from overhead, and then a ragged roar: “ATFENTION
JAMES VANDALEUR AND ANDROiD. ATTENTION JAMES VANDALEUR
AND ANDROID.”
Vandaleur sta rted and looked up. The lone helicopter was floating above them.
From its belly came amplified commands:
“YOU ARE SURROUNDED. THE ROAD IS BLOCKED. YOU ARE TO STOP
YOUR CAR AT ONCE AND SUBMIT TO ARREST. STOP AT ONCE!”
I looked at Vandaleur for orders.
“Keep driving,” Vandaleur snapped.
The helicopter dropped lower “ATTENTION ANDROID. YOU ARE IN
CONTROL OF THE VEHICLE. YOU ARE TO STOP AT ONCE. THIS IS A STATE DIRECTIVE SUPERSEDING ALL PRIVATE COMMANDS!”
The car slowed.
“What the hell are you doing?” I shouted.
“A state directive supercedes all private commands,” the android answered. “I must point out to you that—”
“Get the hell away from the wheel,” Vandaleur ordered. I clubbed the android, yanked him sideways and squirmed Over him to the wheel. The car veered off the road in that moment and went churning through the frozen mud and dry reeds.
Vandaleur regained control and continued westward through the marshes toward a parallel highway five miles distant.
“We’ll beat their goddamned block,” he grunted. The car pounded and surged.
The helicopter dropped even lower. A searchlight blazed from the belly of the plane.
“ATTENTION JAMES VANDALEUR AND ANDROID. SUBMIT TO
ARREST. THIS IS A STATE DIRECTIVE SUPERSEDING ALL PRIVATE
COMMANDS.”
“He can’t submit,” Vandaleur shouted wildly. “There’s no one to submit to. He can’t and I won’t.”
“Christ!” I muttered. “We’ll beat them yet. We’ll beat the block. We’ll beat the heat. We’ll—”
“I must point out to you,” I said, “that I am required by my prime directive to obey state directives which supersede all private commands. I must submit to arrest.”
“Who says it’s a state directive?” Vandaleur said. “Them? Up in that plane?
They’ve got to show credentials. They’ve got to prove it’s state authority before you submit. How d’you know they’re not crooks trying to trick us?"
Holding the wheel with one arm, he reached into his side pocket to make sure the gun was still in place. The car skidded.
The tires squealed on frost and reeds. The wheel was wrenched from his grasp and the car yawed up a small hillock and overturned. The motor roared and the wheels screamed. Vandaleur crawled out and dragged the android with him. For the moment we were outside the cone of light blazing down from the helicopter. We blundered off into the marsh, into the blackness; into concealment. . . Vandaleur running with a pounding heart, hauling the android along.
The helicopter circled and soared over the wrecked car, searchlight peering, loudspeaker braying. On the highway we had left, lights appeared as the pursuing and blocking parties gathered and followed radio directions from the plane. Vandaleur and the android continued deeper and deeper into the marsh, working their way towards the parallel road and safety. It was night by now. The sky was a black matte.
Not a star showed. The temperature was dropping. A southeast night wind knifed us to the bone.
Far behind there was a dull concussion. Vandaleur turned, gasping. The car’s fuel had exploded. A geyser of flame shot up like a lurid fountain. It subsided into a low crater of burning reeds. Whipped by the wind, the distant hem of flame fanned up into- a wall, ten feet high. The wall began marching down on us, crackling fiercely.
Above it, a pall of oily smoke surged forward. Behind it, Vandaleur could make out the figures of men.. a mass of beaters searching the marsh.
“Christ!” I cried and searched desperately for safety. He ran, dragging me with him, until their feet crunched through the surface ice of a pool. He trampled the ice furiously, then flung himself down in the numbing water, pulling the android with us.
The wall of flame approached. I could hear the crackle and feel the heat. He could see the searchers clearly. Vandaleur reached into his side pocket for the gun. The pocket was torn. The gun was gone. He groaned and shook with cold and terror.
The light from the marsh fire was blinding. Overhead, the helicopter floated helplessly to one side, unable to fly through the smoke and flames and aid the searchers, who were beating far to the right of us.
“They’ll miss us,” Vandaleur whispered. “Keep quiet. That’s an order. They’ll miss us. We’ll beat them. We’ll beat the fire. We’ll—”
Three distinct shots sounded less than a hundred feet from the fugitives. Blam!
Blam! Blam! They came from the last three cartridges in my gun as the marsh fire reached it where it had dropped, and exploded the shells. The searchers turned toward the sound and began working directly toward us. Vandaieur cursed hysterically and tried to submerge even deeper to escape the intolerable heat of the fire. The android began to twitch.
The wall of flame surged up to them. Vandaleur took a deep breath and prepared to submerge until the flame passed over them. The android shuddered and suddenly began to scream.
“All reet! All reet!” it shouted. “Be fleet be fleet!”
“Damn you!” I shouted. I tried to drown the android.
“Damn you!” I cursed. I smashed Vandaleur’s face.
The. android battered Vandaleur, who fought it off until it burst out of the mud and staggered upright. Before I could return to the attack, the live flames captured it hypnotically. It danced and capered in a lunatic rumba before the wall of fire.
Its legs twisted. Its arms waved. The fingers writhed in a private rumba of their own. It shrieked and sang and ran in a crooked waltz before the embrace of the heat, a muddy monster silhouetted against the brilliant sparkling flare.
The searchers shouted. There were shots. The android spun around twice and then continued its horrid dance before the face of the flames. There was a rising gust of wind. The fire swept around the capering figure and enveloped it for a roaring moment. Then the fire swept on, leaving behind it a sobbing mass of synthetic flesh oozing scarlet blood that would never coagulate.
The thermometer would have registered 1200° wondrously Fahrenheit.
Vandaleur didn’t die. I got away. They missed him while they watched the android caper and die. But I don’t know which of us he is these days. Psychotic projection, Wanda warned me. Projection, Nan Webb told him. If you live with a crazy machine long enough, I become crazy too. Reet!
But we know the truth. We know that they were wrong. It was the other way around. It was the man that was corrupting the machine... . . any machine... . . all machines. The new robot and Vandaleur know that because the new robot’s started twitching too. Reet!
Here on cold Pollux, the robot is twitching and singing. No heat, but my fingers writhe. No heat, but it’s taken the little Talley girl off for a solitary walk. A cheap labor robot. . . A servo-mechanism. . . all I could afford.. . but it’s twitching and humming and walking alone with the child somewhere and I can’t fmd them. Christ!